Milestone: Portfolio Surpasses $30,000!

I've been in Japan for the last little while but that doesn't mean I haven't been watching the market.  If you haven't been following, the market is on fire like the flames from Mt. Doom (in Mordor).  Because of that it's pushed my portfolio passed the $30,000 mark!  This is a big achievement for me.  I have never had this much money at my finger tips before.

I could, if I so wanted, go out and buy a Mini Cooper right now with zero need to go to a bank.  I could, if I was so persuaded, take a huge long vacation staying in expensive hotels and dining at the finest restaurants.  I could even, if the feeling so arose, pay for a six year college education including one year of study abroad in Japan (I should know).

However I don't feel like doing any of those things.  In fact the next vehicle purchase I make will probably be more than ten years down the road and it will be a bike.  My next vacation is being taken on a bike.  And, although I don't think I'm going back to school anytime soon (not that I didn't have a good time), my next educational foray will probably be via Treehouse.

Perhaps the surreal thing is that although it took me about four years to pay off six years of college, credit cards, and a car, it's only taken me fourteen months to save up a stash equating to 85% of that same amount.  That really demonstrates: how interest rates kill you if you aren't on the receiving end of them, and the job of money is to make money.

Back in January I revealed for the first time what I am holding.  At that time my portfolio was worth $25188.70.  With the recent drive in value by the market I just hit $30125.13!  That's an increase of almost $5000 in about two months.  Not to keeping adding cherries on top but I still have capital that I want to deploy.

I'm not a genius.  Looking at my portfolio people might be confused.  "Apple!?  That's not a dividend paying stock!"  "Why's he buying individual equities but also Vanguard 500?"  Well that's because I'm not a genius.  And yet here I am on my way to FI.  I am also not a big enough fool to think this can't go back down.  In addition it's more about how much the portfolio firing off in dividends than it's actual total value.  But I'm not going to ignore the obvious correlation between portfolio size and dividend payout.  Put simply "the more, the more."

Frankly a stock sell off would be pretty cool right now as it's getting harder to find good values.  But in the mean time I'll enjoy the view from 30,000.

Mata ne,

Kechi